CS Luceafărul Oradea

First years and ascension (2001–2008)

Founded in 2001, at the initiative of several parents whose children had no future at FC Bihor, Luceafărul was grown by the former Prefect of Bihor County, Gavrilă Ghilea, former boss of FC Bihor. For the first 5 seasons of its existence, Luceafărul have activated only at youth level, reaching the final stages of the championship at different youth groups for 3 times, but then the team from Oradea grew step by step and from the training of children they have reached a professional status in 2006 when Luceafărul merged with Lotus Băile Felix. After a first perfect season, they managed to promote to the Liga II. The miracle did not last long, because the lack of money led to the withdrawal of the team from the championship.

Luceferii started the 2007–08 season with a new head coach, Lucian Ciocan and after a new great season, Luceafărul Lotus earned the promotion to the Liga II, but subsequently they announced their withdrawal due to financial reasons. A group of businessmen from Bacău decided to form a new team to occupy the vacant spot. Thus, Ştiinţa Bacău was born after a merge.^[1]

Știința Bacău, a failed project (2008–2009)

FC Știința Bacău was probably one of the most strange football clubs in the history of the Romanian football. After Luceafărul Lotus disappeared, Știința was born, but after only a half of season the club encountered serious financial problems. In February 2009 businessman Giani Nedelcu joined with Mircea Crainiciuc and refounded back the club dissolved last summer, Luceafărul Lotus Băile Felix and took Ştiinţa's place in the championship. But until the end of the season, they continued to play under the name of Ştiinţa Bacău.^[2] In fact the club was a strange mix of influences from 3 different clubs, remains of Rocar București, Luceafărul Lotus and Știința Bacău. In fact the club wanted to be a fresh alternative to the Bacău football problems, but it ended by being nothing but a team without supporters, tradition, with players transferred in the last moment and with a poor management.

On 3 June 2009, Mircea Crainiciuc announced that the club withdrew from the championship because of financial reasons. They lost their remaining 3 matches from the 2008-09 Liga II season with 0–3 and relegated to the Liga III, ending a strange, unique and turbulent moment in the history of the club.^[3]

Luceafărul reborn from ashes, several times (2008–present)

The old club was refounded in the summer of 2008 as Luceafărul Oradea, its original name, and started from Liga IV-Bihor County, functioning in parallel with the old entity, called then Știința, for a season.

After two seasons the club promoted back to the Liga II, at the end of the 2010–11 Liga III season. A new head coach was hired in the summer of 2011, the Brașov born Călin Moldovan. On 9 December 2011 he was fired and replaced with Leontin Grozavu.^[4]

It finished 6th in the 2011–12 Liga II and 10th in the 2012–13 Liga II. In 2011 they also played a Round of 32 match in the Cupa României against Dinamo București, lost 0-1.

On 10 July 2013 it was announced that Luceafărul withdrew from the Liga II and would be enrolled in the Liga IV for the 2013–14 season. This movement has been accomplished in order to help FC Bihor, Oradea and Bihor County most important club, which was in serious financial and sporting problems at that time.^[5]

At the end of the 2014–15 Liga IV season, Luceafărul promoted back to Liga III after an impressive journey: 18 victories, 1 draw, no defeats, 177 goals scored and only 7 received. The goalscorer of the team was Constantin Roșu who scored 51 goals in 26 matches for the red and blues.^[6]

At the end of the 2015–16 Liga III season, Luceafărul promoted to Liga II, after a single Liga III season, in which they led and dominated their series almost all season.^[7]

Its first season after promotion was an oscillating one for the red and blues. After a first part dominated by poor results and more coach changes, but with a round of 16 match played in the Cupa României against the defending Liga I champions, Astra Giurgiu, Luceafărul, with new important players in the squad like: Claudiu Codoban or Marius Matei, made a very good second part and finished on the 10th place, in the middle of the table.

2017–18 Liga II season has brought thoughts of promotion to Oradea, the owner of the club, Ioan Blidaru, desiring more than the second league and for this he set up Cornel Țălnar and Florentin Petre as coaches, and some experienced players were transferred, among them Andrei Hergheligiu, Andrei Cordoș or Petre Goge.^[8] But the start of the season was almost to kill the team from Oradea for the 4th time in its history. After 4 rounds Luceafărul had 1 point, 4 rounds in which the team played 3 matches at home (1-1 against Sportul Snagov, 1-2 against Ripensia Timișoara and 3-4 against Dacia Unirea Brăila) and only 1 match away (2-3 against Târgu Mureș). But the real problem was that Sportul Snagov and Dacia Unirea Brăila were teams with organizational or financial problems, Ripensia was a new promoted team and also the team with the smallest budget in the league and Târgu Mureș, despite it was a new relegated team, was threatened with bankruptcy, which was going to happen during the winter break.^[9]

The bubble broke after the match against Dacia Unirea Brăila, a match with a spectacular evolution of the score. Ioan Blidaru announced that he is withdrawing from the team and all the players and coaches are free agents, basically leading to the disbanding of the team.^[10] The news shocked the media, the supporters and all started to become truth when Luceafărul didn’t play at Pitești against FC Argeș. At the second default, the team would be excluded from the championship, but than another unexpected fact happened, Luceafărul and their stadium were bought through intermediaries by Nicolae Sarcină, a businessman from Gorj County, who was known for buying by the same procedure the Liga III club CS Șirineasa.^[11]

Then a very turbulent period followed, first of all there have been serious accusations that the former owner, Blidaru, have withdrawn because he suspected the players to be involved in the betting mafia, the confessions being made by the former coach Cornel Țălnar.^[12] After this scandal, Luceafărul tried to reborn, as he had done so many times, in the squad remained some of the local players and the new owner tried to complete the squad with players from its other controlled team, Șirineasa, also former international player, Cristian Dulca was named as the new coach. Rebuilding in the middle of the season proved to be extremely difficult and the results were left out, but the scandals have returned to the forefront. After buying CS Șirineasa, Sarcină moved the team from Șirineasa to Petroșani and the fact that he was from Gorj County not from Bihor County or even Transylvania has brought the first speculation that he plans to move the team to Târgu Jiu, Petroșani or Motru, even talking about a merger with the Liga III team or its abandonment in favor of Luceafărul and a Liga II spot, in any case, no option included Oradea and the team's stay in its hometown.^[13] However, although some rumors even had evidence, the ownership of the club has rejected any such attempt claiming that the team will remain in Oradea, it seemed like a new Știința Bacău episode might appear.^[14] After the bustle and the scandals have subsided, luceferii, despite a small number of players, began to produce results, coming out of the relegation area before the winter break, Claudiu Codoban and Vlad Rusu, being the main weapons of the team near the Băile Felix.

Rivalries

Luceafărul Oradea does not have important rivalries, the only important one was born between 2011 and 2013, against FC Bihor, but the rivalry was far from being a bitter one, the two clubs working well together and Luceafărul even retired from the championship to enter into a partnership with its rival, in 2013.

First team squad

As of 2 October 2018

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 1 GK Alin Goia 2 DF Ionuț Gruia 3 MF Narcis Cîrlig (on loan from Energeticianul) 4 DF Alexandru Core 5 DF Cristian Oroș (Captain) 6 DF Andrei Tânc 7 DF Ionuț Ban 8 MF Alexandru Dulca 9 FW Cătălin Țîră 10 MF Claudiu Codoban (Vice-Captain) 11 FW Constantin Roșu (Vice-Captain) 12 GK Sebastian Moroz 13 FW Andrei Ludușan 14 MF Gabriel Preoteasa 15 DF Vlad Opriș

No. Position Player 16 MF Vasile Pop 17 MF Paul Mitrică 18 DF Cătălin Toriște 19 DF Flaviu Drăgan 20 MF Vlad Prejmerean 21 FW Răzvan Gunie 22 DF Alexandru Băican 23 DF Kevin Moihedja 24 FW Sergiu Pop 25 FW Daniel Lăsconi (on loan from Energeticianul) 26 MF Hery Kim 27 MF Paul Chiorean 28 MF Patrick Peter 29 FW Daniel Paraschiv 95 GK Bogdan Moga

Out on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player — GK Ovidiu Jianu (to Șoimii Lipova)

No. Position Player

Out on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player — GK Ovidiu Jianu (to Șoimii Lipova)

No. Position Player